Technology products distributor Arbitech LLC is working to hold on to its laid-back Laguna Beach vibe in an Irvine Spectrum office park.
The company, which started in 2000 in a tiny office next to a liquor store, spent its early years a stone’s throw from Main Beach in Laguna.
Making the move to Irvine nearly four years ago came with a lot of soul searching, according to Josh McCarter, president and operations chief.
“One of the initial challenges was moving from a very tiny office where we were literally sharing desks and having a beach vibe to coming to the concrete jungle in Irvine,” he said.
Arbitech ranked No. 2 in the medium company category in the Business Journal’s inaugural Best Places to Work list.
The list was compiled for the Business Journal by Harrisburg, Pa.-based Best Companies Group, an independent workplace researcher that managed the registration process, conducted surveys, evaluated data and selected companies for the list based on overall scores from queries of management and employees.
Beach Culture
In the spirit of preserving a bit of Laguna, Arbitech has brought a little bit of the beach to the office.
Suits are verboten. Jeans are the norm.
The company maintains a couple of big salt water fish tanks teeming with tropical creatures, including a big spotted eel and a small shark.
A wraparound mural depicting scenes from Main Beach and Laguna’s boardwalk brightens up the lunch room, where workers eat family-style at picnic tables.
“We try to encourage people to try to cross-pollinate during the lunches to sit with people that they otherwise might not spend a lot of time with,” McCarter said. “It gives a sense of community and family when you have people break bread together.”
The company pays for lunch, which is catered in daily. It also stocks the kitchen with healthy snacks and quick eats for workers who arrive early or stay late.
Employees are encouraged to get a bit of down time into their work day.
They can work out at Arbitech’s onsite gym, which recently got a machine for Pilates.
Workers in Arbitech’s 20,000-square-foot warehouse unwind with a pickup game of basketball on a hoop in the corner.
Others retreat to the “fun zone” for lively games of ping-pong, pool and “Rock Band.”
The company employs an onsite nutritionist and personal trainer, who oversee the weekly menus and help create eating and
fitness plans for workers. The company subsidizes workers who do individual training sessions.
Entertainment Committee
Arbitech likes to get its workers together outside the office, too.
There’s an “entertainment committee” that’s tasked with organizing family-friendly events every few months.
“Coming here is work, but it doesn’t really feel like work,” said Jaime Chabot, an accounts payable specialist who’s been with the company for more than six years. “You get to know people really well here.”
In past years, Arbitech workers have done go-cart racing, bowling, karaoke and miniature golf. Its ninth anniversary party was held at Newport Dunes in the Back Bay.
“When we started, there was only one guy here who had kids,” McCarter said. “But now there’s like 40 or 50 kids among us. From a family standpoint, we really try to be inclusive of the employees’ spouses and kids. It promotes friendships.”
Workers have done rafting trips, climbed Mount Kilimanjaro and competed on sports teams.
Culturally, the company is big on inclusive-ness, personal development and well-being.
One of its biggest challenges, according to McCarter, is “keeping that same family vibe and small company mentality while you are scaling and introducing a more professional management structure.”
“A lot of times, that destroys a corporate culture,” he said.
Arbitech was founded by Torin Pavia, who started the company as a pet project while studying at the University of Southern California’s Marshall School of Business.
It puts a twist on the distribution of computer products. It uses arbitrage, or profiting off different prices for the same product in different markets.
Arbitrage long has been used in currency markets where traders buy and sell at favorable price differences. Pavia said he noticed that in computer products, resellers often have too much inventory that isn’t returnable to the manufacturer.
Arbitech finds resellers with an excess product, buys it and sells it for less than what a big distributor would charge.
The company’s competitors are big, including Santa Ana’s Ingram Micro Inc. and Clearwater, Fla.-based Tech Data Corp.
It distributes tech gear from IBM Corp., Hewlett-Packard Co., Cisco Systems Inc., Microsoft Corp. and many others.
It also works with a few locals: Fountain Valley’s Kingston Technology Co., Aliso Viejo’s QLogic Corp. and Costa Mesa’s Emulex Corp.
Lately, the company has gotten into distributing consumer products, such as laptop and desktop computers. It also helps corporate customers by configuring computers and servers—loading them up with software, adapter cards and networking gear—before shipping them out.
Arbitech saw nearly $200 million in sales last year and has roughly 85 workers here.
